Wednesday, January 14, 2009

He never did take off his hat

In my childhood in Chicago, Gypsies were the people who lived in store fronts and hung sheets in the display windows for privacy. They told fortunes, and you had to be desperate to go and knock on the window or door of a Gypsy "tent" and ask for an oracle, since (believe it or not) fortune-telling for money was illegal in those days. I don't ever remember seeing Gypsy children.

In Portland, I met the Gypsies. They are likeable folk, and the years between childhood and manhood having passed through the marches of Hippiedom, for me there was no strangeness in dealing with or seeing them.

They have a local hierarchy. The "king of the Gypsies" lives on a large suburban estate on the east side of town in a rambling ranch house surrounded by immaculate white corral fencing, and there are cast lions on either side of the driveway entrance. My godmother, who is a real estate professional, knows the king (or knew him, I heard he recently passed away, and I'm not sure who his successor is), and many other gypsies. They tend to interface more with our women than with us men, except in the case of an incident I will now relate.

One day a late middle aged gypsy gentleman waltzed into Aghía Triás church after liturgy had started, like most of us do. He was wearing a floppy hat hung with pins, had on a nice Gypsy sport jacket with a clutch of numerous heavy occult and Christian trinkets and baubles suspended against his chest between its lapels. He gamboled down the middle aisle, which none of us would do, and found a seat right in the center of the sanctuary, grinning broadly as he looked about him in an outgoing manner.

Communion time finally came, and I wondered what he would do.

As the usher invited the people in his pew to enter the communion line that forms in center aisle, surprisingly he left his place and stepped right in line, grinning and flirting with the children and babies like a clown. I was far enough back to where I never even got into the line while he approached Father Elias (eternal be his memory) holding the Communion cup and spoon.

As the Gypsy came face to face with Father Elias, there was a distinct pause, and you could see that Father was questioning him. (Communion is only for the Orthodox, and a stranger has to identify himself to the priest in order to receive communion.) After the brief interruption, it looked like Father Elias gave the Gypsy communion, and the man walked off, forgetting to pick up a chunk of antídoron (the bread of fellowship we all take after receiving communion) as he walked back. (Gypsies are sometimes Orthodox.)

Smiling now more broadly than ever, and even chortling audibly to himself as he flashed happy eyes at everyone he passed on the side aisle, he finally came to my row, though I was standing in the middle, not the end, of the pew. At the end, however, stood a very handsome Greek-American man groomed and dressed in Country Western style, complete with gleaming cowboy boots, someone whom I knew slightly, but a very private kind of guy and perhaps a little older than me.

As the Gypsy came up to him, he suddenly turned aside toward my friend, grabbed him in an irresistible bear hug, and planted a big, luscious kiss on his cheek, let him go briefly, gave him a mighty friendly handshake, and then continued on his way down the side aisle, and out the door.

I looked back over my shoulder to see where he went. Still smiling and congratulating the people standing around in the narthex by brusquely shaking their hands, he passed out of view, out the door and into the street.

He never did take off his hat.

9 comments:

Jim Swindle said...

This post stirs up several thoughts in me.
--We usually are too quick to judge those whose culture and customs are quite different from our own.

--The Lord loves people who are quite different from each other.

--Those who have been forgiven much, love much.

--Some people think they have been forgiven, who have not really been forgiven. I don't know about your Gypsy. His love would seem to say he was a true believer. His occult trappings would seem to say that if he was a true believer, he was dangerously immature in the faith.

May the Lord do a great work in the Gypsies and in various other largely-forgotten peoples.

Ρωμανός ~ Romanós said...

Jim, thanks for your comments. There is a lot to ponder in this story, for sure.

The universality of the Father's love and the accessibility to Him by any man, woman or child regardless of church affiliation or cultural context is one of them (Jesus is the only saviour of mankind, being a given).

Orthodox Christianity has more rules and regulations than probably any church, yet sometimes it seems we're the only ones who know they're just rules and when to break them. The gentleness, generosity and modesty shown by our priests to those who wander into the flock from the wilderness is famous among us but little known to the world. Father Elias, a true pastor and man of God, knew when to welcome and when to rebuff, just as Jesus does. The self-righteous and confident have little place at the Lord's supper, not so the repentant and forgiven sinner. I never saw that Gypsy again, but as you can see, I have remembered (and treasured) that "sermon" more than many others that were only spoken from a pulpit.

As for the man's jingles, those tokens he wore about him, a mixture of crosses, talismans and whatnot: As a gauge of the maturity of his faith, it's hard to say for sure. Often people who have dramatic personalities accumulate on their person and in their surroundings tokens of events of significance in their lives without any exercise of reason. In other words, what they meant to him might not be what they would mean to us. As you wrote, "His love would seem to say he was a true believer," and I would agree, as did Father Elias apparently. I have known Greeks who pin a talisman against the evil eye on a baby's wraps just because Yiayia (granny) told them to do it, while at the same time their faith was sound and mature in real life. And then, knowing their Yiayia in a spiritual context, as I often did, I was amazed at the depth of her real faith as well, and usually of the strength of her bible belief. Yet there she was, pinning a "matya" on her grandson's blanket! There can often be a disconnect between our real lives of faith and some of the little things we do.

The bottom line is, as you wrote, dear brother, "Those who have been forgiven much, love much."

Randy Hurst said...

...again, a beautiful snapshot of the embrace of Grace.

Anonymous said...

Like your most recent post...a great example of the paradox of Grace. There will be many surprises when we get to heaven.

Certain American Indigenous tribes have individuals whose sole responsibility it is to behave in the opposite way than one would expect. When everyone advances, they retreat. When everyone laughs, they cry. I think that often we would find that these "opposite people" show us the reasons why we should behave "normally" (whatever that might mean), but sometimes...some really beautiful time...we might just learn that these "opposite" ways are not so opposite after all. Maybe, possibly, there is something to learn from a man who dances joyfully down the aisle to partake in the reminder of God's unimaginable gift to us. We, who so often march single file and orderly, like mourners heading to view a casket, could stand to bubble over in joyful dancing at this amazing gift!

This story brought a tear to my eye. Thank you brother Romanos!

Anonymous said...

This is a great story. What a great spirit to take communion in: with such joy and attempts at fellowship with those around him.

And really, the gypsy man would stand out less in most of our churches than Jesus himself.
Certainly he sounds like a colorful character. and I can see the challenges in some of this.

But consider Jesus: he was essentially homeless for most of his ministry. It's hard to imagine he frequently had oppurtunities to change his clothes, to wash the sweat and dirt from himself...
It's perhaps a bit provacative to phrase things in this manner, but it's not untrue to reflect on the idea that Jesus probably looked more like Osamma Bin Ladden then the blonde-haired, blue eyed depictions that still propogate themselves pretty much everywhere.

Ρωμανός ~ Romanós said...

Yes, Jeff, the Gypsy received communion in a spirit of very great joy, which is appropriate for one who realizes that all his sins have been taken away, and that he has just been fed the Body and Blood of Christ unto life eternal, but there are also other responses possible, for example—awe at being invited to such a banquet, and love (which the Gypsy definitely manifested) at being forgiven.

At the beginning of communion, the deacon holds up the Cup for all to see, and proclaims, "With fear of God, with faith and love, draw near!" Obviously, joy must be a given, otherwise he would mention it as well.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean when you commented that the Gypsy attempted to fellowhip with those around him. I don't think "fellowship" in the sense you mean it is part of the Orthodox experience of worship. For us, the very act of receiving communion is the supreme form of fellowship to which all other forms are subordinate. This is why a Christian from another culture and language (like this Gypsy) can come among us, and pray and worship with us, and being unable to communicate in any other way, can still know and experience his perfect koinonía (Greek, "fellowship") with us. That doesn't depend on his ability to communicate with us in our language or cultural idiom. This is one of the strengths of Orthodoxy, we are not limited by our language or culture.

As for the Gypsy man "standing out less in most of our churches than would Jesus Himself," well, I guess you are speaking for the non-Orthodox churches, for one thing, and for another, it's a speculation we cannot make without fantasizing. This is a nonsensical proposition.

Also, I cannot disagree more with your image of the historical Jesus, which from having been subject to an American "white" Jesus, racially Germanic, you now overreact in the other direction, and make him the cultural and racial equivqlent of the slime of humanity, Osama bin Laden. Think a little more deeply, brother, and don't insult your own intelligence or the witness of the scriptures and of the living tradition of both Jews and Orthodox Christians.

Hang out with modern believing (Conservative or Orthodox) Jews, pray with them, worship with them, attend synagogue shabbat services with them, and you will begin to understand the historical Jesus, because even for the lapse of 2000 years, rabbinical Jews are still closer to the historical Jesus than the average white Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Then you will see how ridiculous it is to say such things as, "he was essentially homeless for most of his ministry… it's hard to imagine he frequently had opportunities to change his clothes, to wash the sweat and dirt from himself…" and worse yet, "it's not untrue to reflect on the idea that Jesus probably looked more like Osama bin Laden than the blonde-haired, blue-eyed depictions that still propagate themselves pretty much everywhere."

No, Jeff, not "pretty much everywhere." Have you looked at any of the depictions of Jesus on my blog? The Orthodox know what Jesus looked like, down to his hair and eye color, his height, and skin tone. Our icons generally bear this out. When a great filmmaker like Zeffirelli wanted to produce the film Jesus of Nazareth he went and looked at the icons of Christ and the holy apostles to see how to cast the characters, and he did a fairly decent job of it, even down to Jesus' blue eyes. (The Jews of ancient times, like the Greeks, exhibited both fair complexioned and dark complexioned people.)

Pretty much everywhere. Well, Jeff, I'd say you've spent most of your life in the confines of a minority Christian culture, and I invite you to take a closer look at "the big Church," that has been around from the day of Pentecost and has continued thriving from then till now. I'm not saying you have to be Orthodox to be saved, but I am saying that you need to widen out a bit, culturally, maybe. What do you think?

Thanks for your comment. I'd like to say more, but not publicly, and I have no email address for you. It seems to me that if you want to dig deeper, you will, and with no help from me. Go with God, my brother in Christ.

Jim Swindle said...

Brother Romanós, I believe you were a bit hard on Jeff. I think/hope that part of what he meant was that if any man came into a typical US church (maybe especially a typical US Protestant church) with full beard and Jewish features and a robe and sandals, he would be very conspicuous. You may be right about the blue eyes, but I'm not sure. I'm also not sure that it matters. In God's wisdom, the scripture does not say Jesus was tall or short, dark or light, stocky or lanky.

Thank you for the perspectives you bring us concerning the Orthodox church. Those perspectives are helpful.

Ρωμανός ~ Romanós said...

Jim, when I said "it's a speculation we cannot make without fantasizing. This is a nonsensical proposition," I was referring to this very idea: "if any man came into a typical US church (maybe especially a typical US Protestant church) with full beard and Jewish features and a robe and sandals, he would be very conspicuous." You see, this couldn't happen, and even if it did, it wouild still say nothing to the issue of whether or not Jesus would be more or less conspicuous than a Gypsy wandering in.

I think there's a major disconnect between what each of us thinks is admissible in a rational discussion. I have run into this clash of sensibilities before, and I usually back off, since nothing is to be gained by controversy—it's the devils work to drive wedges between the brethren, and I want none of it.

Orthodoxy is rather harder and more demanding than some other kinds of Christianity, but that is the part of the Body that it is. It's the caretaker of the holy scriptures and the spiritual ethos of Christianity, and it has survived till these last days intact because it is hard and demanding, but also vigilant. What we have saved, we saved for you, whenever you want it. (I also put myself with you as a beneficiary of Orthodoxy's struggle to preserve the scriptures and the evangelical faith.)

Nothing could be truer than saying that it doesn't matter what Jesus looked like, even though the Orthodox claim that we know. It would be better to forget that we know, if it were to bring about dissension among the brethren, and in fact, things like this are never insisted upon by the Orthodox; they're just there for those who are interested in such things.

Jim Swindle said...

Brother, I'd agree with you that Jeff's proposition (and mine) called for speculation.

I rejoice with you that the Orthodox church has served as a guardian of the faith.